Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Back Home!

I was finally sprung yesterday afternoon and am now ready to start my home recovery. It wasn't what you would call a "clean" getaway -- I still have a drain attached to the incision site, which makes it a pain to dress, shower, etc. -- but the kidney itself appears to be functioning fine.

Sorry for the lack of updates after Thursday. Friday and Saturday were fairly uneventful but I then had a setback of sorts on Sunday morning. After breakfast, I was standing up for Nicky to give me a wipedown (cleaning with hand wipes) when I suddenly felt horribly dizzy. As I collapsed back into bed, my lower abdomen suddenly swelled almost out of control, and I felt excruciating pain. Happily, the day nurse had just come on duty and had just stopped by our room. She was able to get several other people to help her in short order. I was put back on oxygen while they tried to figure out what had happened to me. The most likely explanation is gas that had been building up in my system suddenly getting trapped and finding no place to go. Bottom line, it took me the better part of two days to feel anything like fully recovered. I found it much harder to walk because some of the muscles in my lower abdomen must have been strained. When we got home yesterday, the soreness made it hard for me to stand upright as I was showering and getting set for bed. Thank God, today the soreness seems a lot more manageable.

I now have a very strict regimen of medications to fight organ rejection and protect me from getting sick due to my immunocompromised state. I'll also have regular visits for blood work and visits to the post-transplant clinic for a while. The real danger zone in terms of major complications is the first 90 days after surgery, so, from now until the end of October, I'm going to have to be particularly careful about crowds and other potentially infectious situations. I'm guessing that Stevenson will ask me to sit out the fall term and come back in February (next January will mark the first time that SU is offering a winter term). As for getting back to blogging, I'm not going to post anything new until at least August 7, the date of my first clinic visit. You can get in touch with me via email (kimba_1962@verizon.net) or my cell phone (443 929 6013) or home phone (410 902 8450). Aside from lab and clinic visits, I'm going to be pretty "house-locked" for a while, so I'd love to hear from you if you get the chance.

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While I was in the hospital, Nicky passed along a bit of sad news. Our longtime favorite local pizza place, New York Pizza Company, has closed. Some of you have gone there with us and know about the place. Luckily, another, and potentially even MORE authentic, pizza and sandwich emporium has just recently opened near the Owings Mills metro stop. Joe will be happy to know that it is the closest thing to Ray Bari pizza that we have yet encountered in this area. In all honesty, the quality of NYPC food had dropped in recent days -- I think that losing one or two of their better cooks didn't help -- and they apparently couldn't make enough money in the Summer to make up for the business they did during the SU school year.